A draft document poised to one day shape development in Pentagon City could be up for Arlington County Board consideration in February.
The document, known as the Pentagon City Sector Plan, culminates a year-plus study of the 116-acre area and the county policies governing its growth. It would replace a 45-year-old document that reached the end of its life in the shadow of Amazon’s under-construction second headquarters.
Arlington County continues to be one of the top localities regionally and nationwide for residents using public transit to commute to and from work, recent census data shows.
Earlier this year, a trove of U.S. census data was released. While much of it remains in need of analyzing, some enterprising researchers are pulling from 2020 data sets to drill down on very specific questions, like which counties have the highest percentage of workers using public transportation to commute.
A decade ago, when Arlington County was in the midst of planning the Crystal City Potomac Yard Transitway for the future Metroway bus rapid transit line, the Route 1 corridor looked a lot different.
Development was still ongoing in the corridor, which encompasses Pentagon City and Crystal City, and Amazon was still years away from selecting the area for its HQ2.
Even as officials and advocates continue to hail the Crystal City-Potomac Yard Transitway as forward-thinking, there’ve been literal instances of backwards driving.
ARLnow has received reports of cars entering the Transitway’s bus lanes, often even driving the wrong direction in the lanes, which parallel Crystal Drive for about a mile. It seems to mostly stem from confusion over the roadway configuration.
When Metroway, the region’s first rapid bus transit line, launched in 2014 it was hailed as the future.
Dedicated lanes, more frequent service, covered stations, and bigger, newer buses along a 4.5-mile route connecting Arlington and Alexandria would boost bus ridership in sections of both jurisdictions that were rapidly developing.
Sponsored by Monday Properties and written by ARLnow, Startup Monday is a weekly column that profiles Arlington-based startups, founders, and other local technology news. Monday Properties is proudly featuring 1812 N. Moore Street in Rosslyn.
(Updated on 11/16/21 at 6 p.m.) Shift5, a Rosslyn-based cybersecurity company, has raised $20 million in Series A funding to help protect the world’s transportation infrastructure and weapons systems from cyberattacks.
Reckless drivers are regularly backing up on I-395 to get to the Express Lanes, despite bollards placed to prevent it.
Video has captured a number of drivers getting onto northbound I-395 from the Route 110 ramp, near the Pentagon, then driving in reverse to get around bollards that block access to the high-occupancy toll lanes. In return for driving the wrong way on a major highway, the drivers get to save a couple of minutes by avoiding minor traffic backups in the main lanes of the 14th Street Bridge.
Locally-owned Good Company Doughnuts & Café in Ballston is trying to save its bustling outdoor patio from being downsized by a county transportation project.
Arlington County is installing a bus shelter in front of the business at 672 N. Glebe Road before the winter. Good Company co-owner Charles Kachadoorian says the shelter will obscure much of the storefront from the street and halve the available outdoor seating, both of which will hurt business.
Amazon has made changes to its plan for the second phase of the company’s HQ2 in Pentagon City.
For the last eight months, Amazon has been hammering out the details of the planned second phase, on the PenPlace site at the corner of S. Eads Street and 12th Street S. Today (Thursday) it unveiled some significant tweaks it has made in response to local feedback.
(Updated at 1:30 p.m.) There’s a new temporary traffic circle along Military Road aimed at improving safety where it intersects with Nelly Custis Drive.
Where there used to be a stop sign for traffic on northbound Military Road, the county has added paint lines, bollards and raised temporary curbs, and partially demolished a median. The work was completed Saturday, according to a spokesman with the Arlington Department of Environmental Services.
With the construction of Amazon’s HQ2, a 45-year-old planning document guiding development in Pentagon City has reached the end of its useful life.
Now, Arlington County has to lay out a vision for the next 20 years of development. According to the most recent draft of the Pentagon City Planning Study, that will include a significant amount of redevelopment and infill development, with an emphasis on residential buildings. Two other priorities are increased green spaces and multimodal transportation upgrades.
A newly-reopened segment of the Washington & Old Dominion (W&OD) Trail in Falls Church boasts a feature that could be replicated in Arlington: separate paths for cyclists and those on foot.
Regional parks authority NOVA Parks widened just over one mile of the trail through the Little City in order to accommodate separate tracks. The organization celebrated the completion of the five-year, $3.7 million project this morning.
